1. Ex-Machina A.I. – What does it mean to be human?

2. The Guardian (London, England)
Why did Nathan make all his A.I.’s women?
Why did he ‘give’ them a ‘sexuality’?
Do you think that someone at U. of T. or UBC or MIT creates A.I. with thoughts of gender and sexuality?
What are the implications?

3. Considering “hubris”
Why are humans seemingly so entitled, so arrogant to think that we are, as Nathan puts it, “Gods”. Do humans creating machines have a built in bias in the creation?

4. Are human weaknesses part of being human? Can we learn and change?
Is compromise (as we learn from our experiences & mistakes) actual change?

5. Wired
Are Ava’s ‘feminine’ features a flaw in her character’s integrity or a plot device? Does it seem realistic in real world A.I. programming?

6. How do we know that Ava truly thinks and feels the way Nathan claims she does?

7. Wired
Might the plot/course of the movie be different if Ava was not representative of an attractive, sexual human?
Do you think of A.I. with a ‘gender or sexuality?

8. Should A. I. (Siri, Alexa etc
Should A.I. (Siri, Alexa etc.) receive gendered pronouns or just stay gender neutral?
If so…in what situations would it be a positive attribution?
In what situations might it be negative?

9. IN the film, how much were the fembots creation simply a part of Nathan seeking pleasure: visual, emotional etc.

10. Why can’t the Turing test be done without gender revealed by the human and robot/A.I machine?
Why did the A.I. use seduction as a manipulative tactic when there are so many other forms of ‘persuasion’?

11. The Atlantic
If A.I. is programmed with millions/billions of possible human reactions to a situation, does this make the feeling equal to a ‘human experience’

12. Is it immoral to make A.I. that is indistinguishable from humans?

13. How can you tell if Ava’s emotions were simulated for the sake of manipulation, or legitimate (as in Nathan had probably run her through millions of simulations…so what is “legitimate”)

14. New York Times
Is is truly possible for A.I. to be truly liberated or are they still products of human creation (and therefore confined to what they are programmed for?)

16. What might have happened if someone else had ‘tested’ Ava?
What if a female had tested her?
Would a ‘child’ testing her be a better, more sensitive option?